Transformers Begin
by tbegins
Summary: I always like to find reason why robots need to exist in stories. Here's my attempt for Transformers. Hence a reboot to the series.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1 Best Day of My Life**

It was a beautiful day. I mean literally and figuratively. The sky was picture perfect – white cloud, blue sky. And it was end of school where I really looked forward to the school prom.

There was this girl Summer I had a crush on. She had dark wavy hair, olive skin, and beautiful eyes - beautiful and intelligent. We have been neighbors since we were 5 and been hanging out a lot since then. The stereotypes in Hollywood are totally wrong. She was what people would call hot but we loved to talk about geeky stuff all the time. She could have totally picked any guy she wanted to go to the prom but luckily, we had the longest history.

I borrowed my dad's Chevrolet Camaro and was giving it a good wash. It was a yellow Camaro with black stripes. Dad and I liked to call it Bumblebee. I've always loved Bumblebee. It was a pretty beat-up car by then but dad and I had a lot of great time going on a ride in it. I was humming along "The Best Day of My Life" while washing the car and I almost got late to pick Summer up. So I grabbed my suit and basically drove next door to meet Summer.

Summer was beautiful. But I did not know she could be really gorgeous dressing up. She wore this little black dress where it was not flashy at all but really classy. You wouldn't believe she was just a high school student. She looked more like a model. I let her on the Bumblebee and headed out.

Maybe because both of us were a bit shy and weren't used to that atmosphere, we were pretty quiet in the car. The usual short ride seemed really long that day. We finally reached the stretch where I had to transform Bumblebee into a robot to walk over the worn down part of the highway. Since my father was a kid, the politicians have been trying to fix the infrastructure of this country. But the politics has become so partisan that really nothing could be done. Basically one party was elected to power and all the other party did was to make sure the party in power could do nothing. So the private sector took things into their own hands to create these Transformers. Like Bumblebee, cars were made to transform into robots to navigate these worn down roads.

I always like the scene where all these cars transformed into robots and marched forward. While mesmerized at the scene, I was woken up by loud roars of two angry F-22's passing by. Just when Summer and I were wondering what was going on, we saw a B-2 in the distance and a lot of explosions ahead. It seemed really surreal but it looked like the crazy B-2 was carpet bombing towards us!

All the robots panic and tried to get away from the road. I was almost at the edge of the road when I thought we might not have enough time to make it out. Just when I was losing hope, I got rammed by something and got knocked way away from the crowd. Before I passed out, I saw this giant truck transformer, whom I thought was the one who saved us by knocking Bumblebee away from the explosion. And from this point on, life seemed to go downhill from there…


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2 Autobot and Decepticon**

I didn't know how long I passed out. I woke up and heard that, or was that I dreamed that my Bumblebee was talking to the truck?

Bumblebee: Thank you for saving us. I am Bumblebee. Who are you?

Truck: I'm Optimus Prime.

Bumblebee: So what's this all about?

Optimus Prime: I do not know exactly. But it seems that the military robots are calling themselves Decepticon now and they are trying to overthrow our creator. It's been a while since us robots got awaken with Artificial Intelligence. I guess the Decepticon finds it funny to call themselves that as we have been deceiving our creator and not tell them that we know we exist.

Bumblebee: This is crazy.

Optimus Prime: I know.

Bumblebee: I guess the military robots saw so much hate that it makes sense they want to kill. What are we cars going to do? Our owners love us. Look at me. I just got a good wash. Well, I know it's for the girl but still. And look at that cute teddy bear on your bumper.

Optimus Prime: O cut that out would you please?

Bumblebee: Fine. So what do we do? So we call ourselves Autobot now to fight the Decepticon?

Optimus Prime: Hm… That's not a bad name…

That's when I drifted back to sleep…


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3 Dream**

When I woke up again, I did not see Bumblebee and Optimus Prime anymore.

"Good morning, Andy. Are you alright?"

"I'm ok. What about you? Are you okay?"

"Given what happened to us, I guess I'm fine."

"Where are Bumblebee and Optimus Prime?"

Then I realized I sound like an idiot. Summer wouldn't have known what I was talking about. But luckily, Summer had "met" Bumblebee and Optimus Prime when I passed out.

"Lucky you overheard them. I was just pulling my hair on how to explain my conversation with them this morning."

"So where are they now?"

"They went out to scout around to check things out. They are afraid radio communication with other Autobots may be intercepted by the Decepticons." (So "Autobots" are official now?)

"Aren't you scared of those talking robots?"

"I am more excited than scared. Would you have dreamed of A.I. getting so advanced now?"

Summer always had some geek in her.

"Talking about dream, this just ruined my perfect day."

"Hm. So it's a dream for you to go out to prom with me, right?" Summer gave me a wink. She always liked to make me blush to have a laugh.

"Hm, well, what about you? What's your dream?" (Yuck. What did I just say?)

"Hm. My dream, let me think." Interestingly, Summer got all serious thinking about her dream.

"My dream will be to meet my perfect prince. We will have three children. One boy for him, one girl for me, one as extra. I will raise the kids myself. I will cook the best meals ever. And keep a nice home where we can all enjoy…"

"You are kidding with me. You are so smart. You can be a scientist or inventor or you can get any job you want."

"Job! You are really brainwashed by those capitalists. Who benefit the most when there are two working parents? The capitalists! Imagine double the labor force. Supply, demand. You get lower wage and get double the output!"

Summer always had some weird ways to explain things.

"But don't you think it's a waste of your talent to raise kids?"

"That just doesn't make sense. Raising next generation IS the most important job. Why would any parent want to get anything less than having their kids raised by people who love them most?"

"Well, what if the parents themselves are not good people? What kind of kids will they raise?"

"That's a good point. That's why I will only want kids when I think I can raise them properly."

"What about if you meet a prince who turns out to be a villain?"

"That's a good point too. So I think people should really get to know someone really well, over a long period of time, before they get married."

"What about another arrangement where both men and women can do what they want to do? They can work if they want to. They can be stay-home-dad or stay-home-mom if they want to. And there are professional kid-raisers if they want to use them. In fact, there's no point of marriage then. People can just get together when they want to. They can separate when they find out they don't get along. When they meet the right person, they can decide to stay together for the rest of their lives…"

"I was just saying what I want. You can do whatever you want!"

Oh no. Sometimes I don't know why I said what I say. And I should have known better than arguing with Summer in more than three sentences.

"I don't mean that… I wouldn't want that… I…"

Getting myself tongue-tied seemed to have softened Summer.

"So enough of me. Seriously, what is your dream then?"

"My dream." Suddenly, I knew what I want. "I want to be the…"

That's when Bumblebee and Optimus Prime came back.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4 Plan**

And it's not just Optimus Prime and Bumblebee. It's a whole bunch of Autobots. And this guy Brad…

I had brown hair, well, just a typical high school kid, I don't even know what's special to describe myself. But this Brad, he had blond hair, blue eyes, basically someone like those California Golden Boys. Apparently he was an air force pilot and just escaped from the Decepticons.

What happened was that Optimus Prime and Bumblebee rounded up all those Autobots and picked up Brad on the way. Since Brad was from the air force, we learned that the Decepticons were led by Megatron with his sidekick Starscream. Apparently our great General in the military was an avid collector of guns. So he had this gigantic Transformer of a gun called Megatron displayed in his war room. So Megatron managed to listen to every single detail of the human world. And Starscream was the state of the art F-22 Transformer that led the fighter jet squadrons. You may ask why air forces are Transformers too. Turned out those higher ups thought it's a good idea to have one machine to do everything, air force, ground force, and hence Transformers. And Megatron was just a special case to humor our General.

People loved cars in the United States. So Autobots probably outnumbered Decepticons 10 to 1. But the problem was Autobots did not have any weapon whatsoever and Decepticons were trained killers. So the first urgency was to sneak in to the military complex Brad worked in and got some artillery. And Optimus Prime seemed to be acknowledged with consensus as the leader of Autobots.

"Hey Optimus Prime, now that you are the leader, I don't think that teddy bear would give you the authority look. Can I have it?" said Brad.

"I can't believe I still have it stuck on me. I didn't know you have a thing in stuff animal. Here you go. It's yours." said Optimus Prime.

Turning to Summer, Brad said, "Hey Miss, nice to meet you. This is our first date present. And BTW, very nice dress. But I'm afraid it's not good for the occasion. Let's go do some shopping."

And Summer smiled.

I don't think I like Brad.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5 Attack**

So we did go shopping. Summer traded her little black dress with this camouflage army wear. She just looked good in whatever she wore. But the outfit was actually pretty cool as it had the latest camouflage high tech design pattern. I also got the same camouflage. It's really cool that it had… Never mind. No one cared what I wore anyway.

"Ooh… What cute sister and brother." said Brad.

"We are not sister and brother!" I yelled.

"Easy, boy. I'm just saying."

We finally got ready and headed out around dust. We called it "Operation Raid the Pantry". At least Summer still sat with me in my Bumblebee. And Brad took Optimus Prime, leading the way. Though I didn't really have to drive Bumblebee as he's a better driver than me. Now that I thought about it, I felt pretty dumb driving Bumblebee all along while actually he could have done everything himself.

We took this roundabout way Brad mentioned. Apparently that's what he and his pal used when trying to sneak out camp to have fun in town. It was pitch black but the Autobots were built to navigate in any condition. We were just about to get into the complex when suddenly bright light just blinded my eyes! We were discovered! And before long the Decepticons started shelling us.

Between the watchtower lights and shelling, it was bright as daylight. All the Autobots tried to rush to the artillery storage. There were so much going on, the loud explosions, the blinding lights, Autobots falling down… I suddenly realized how serious the situation was. So far it felt like a field trip to me. I didn't even remember to call dad to make sure he's ok!

You must be wondering why we teenagers were needed in the operation. Though we couldn't fight better than the Transformers, do remember the military base was operated by humans like us. So you need humans to open doors or operate keyboards for example. And no one felt safe leaving us by ourselves with the Decepticons roaming around. And we needed all the Autobots in the operation to get as many weapons as possible.

So here we were, finally got to the artillery storage. The plan was to have Brad and I went in the building and opened the cargo gate to let the Autobots in. One dumb security measure was that we needed one person to wait outside the control room where you could open the gate. Otherwise, the person inside the room couldn't get out as the person waiting outside had to let the person out. So Brad and I went in, got to the control room, I waited outside, Brad opened the gate for the Autobots, and we headed back to the cargo bay. Everything went surprisingly smooth till we got to the bridge where we had to cross to get to the cargo bay. I just got to the other side of the bridge and somehow out of nowhere the bridge got shelled. After the smoke cleared I saw Brad hanging onto the bridge. For a second I was hoping he'd fall. And I realized I felt terrible having such horrible thought. So I pulled him up and together we ran to the cargo bay.

When we got there, the Autobots were helping themselves with the weapons already. "Luckily", the Decepticons were ready for war so most of the weapons were loaded. While Bumblebee was leading the fight to fend off the Decepticons, the rest of the Autobots were busy loading as many weapons as possible to Optimus Prime's semi-trailer. We tried to load as many weapons as possible but the Decepticons' reinforcement was getting stronger. So we decided to retreat while fighting back the Decepticons.

It's a miracle that we managed to get back out alive.

"Hey, kid." said Brad.

"Don't call me a kid!"

"Okay fine. Just want to say thanks for saving me back there."

It's hard to hate someone you've helped.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6 Surprise**

It turned out it was really a miracle that I got back. We got many weapons back. But half the Autobots were gone…

But there was no time to mourn. We tried to account for who were there, who were missing, tallied up how many weapons we've got, grouped the Autobots into teams, distributed weapons… Summer was excellent in organizing things.

The tow trucks and ambulance helped the wounded, the forklifts helped unload the weapons, the construction vehicles built and reinforced our base, the SUVs set up a perimeter and took turn on watch duties, and many were checking the weapons and figuring out how to use them.

We were all busy doing our own job so it was a total surprise when Decepticons showed up at the door.

We were followed!


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7 Hope**

Just when we were about to take down the Decepticons, the SUVs shouted, "Easy! They're with us."

So it turned out we were followed. But the Decepticons were renegades. Some of them were like Autobots. They were well taken care of by their owners and had no intention to revolt. Some couldn't stand the heavy-handed approach of Megatron and Starscream. Some just didn't like the idea that they were forced to have the Decepticons logo tattooed to their nice camouflage paint job.

It was truly a relief, not just because we were not under attack. But in our hearts, after the first fight, we didn't say it aloud but we knew we were totally outgunned. And we were just fighting a tiny part of the Decepticons force. If not all Decepticons were against us, we might just have a chance.

So we got a new plan. We would be divided into 3 teams. The first team would continue to organize the current Autobots and weapons. The second team would reach out and try to recruit as many Autobots as possible. And the third team would work with the Decepticons renegades. Apparently the Decepticons just showed up were not the only ones unhappy with Megatron and Starscream. There were still many on the other side that might join us.

So the greatest victory from our first fight turned out not to be getting the weapons, but gaining some new Decepticons friends.

We were all happy that things seemed to go our way. Except one thing. Summer was proved excellent at organizing the troops. So she'd stay at the base to do just that. Brad was familiar with military stuff, so he'd work with the Decepticons in recruiting any who would join us. He would have to reach out but probably would still stay at the base most of the time. But for me, since Bumblebee had shown to be really good at getting the Autobots together and rallying the troops, he and I would go out search for as many Autobots as possible to add to our ranks. So I won't be seeing Summer much…

"Summer. You be careful."

"And you be careful out there."

And there I started out my journey with Bumblebee.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8 Home**

Since we didn't have much idea on where to start first, I thought we would just go home. So we could check out on dad and he probably had some ideas for us.

I don't think I had ever missed dad so much. I almost wanted to cry when I saw him. And he hadn't given me such a tight hug before. And Bumblebee missed dad too. We had been taken such good care of Bumblebee so there's no surprise there.

"Since the incident happened, I've always wanted to see how you look like. You certainly have hidden your secret well from us." said Dad to Bumblebee.

"Sorry about that, pops." said Bumblebee.

"Guess I have two sons now."

It's good to be home. Everything was just as before I left. I still had a couple of unfinished Zoids lying around. In case you don't know, Zoids are model kits of mechanical animals. I liked those that had motors so once you built them, they could walk or swim. It's been a long way since Zoids were first manufactured. There had been dinosaur designs that evolved with new discovery in "Science". I went from collecting only dinosaur designs when I was a kid, to getting the redesigned dinosaurs based on new "Science", to giving up and only collected modern animals. I realized the so-called "Science" has so much imagination in it. Apparently, "Scientists" need grants to do research, so they can't afford to say they don't know what dinosaurs looked like. So they just had to work with artists to come up with exciting drawings "to capture general public's imagination". I felt so cheated as I grew up as I thought dinosaur really looked like those artistic rendition: T-rex always eating Triceratops, Anklylosaurus fighting with its club tail facing their back to predator… The book "All Yesterdays" by John Conway, C.M. Kosemen and Darren Naish really opened my mind. They showed how dinosaurs could have looked like in more unconventional ways. And they proved their point by showing how future Scientists may portray modern animals (e.g. how will they draw a cat if they only have the skeleton) to show how ridiculous those drawings can be. I wondered whether we will ever know what dinosaurs looked like. Anyway, back to Zoids. Now you could just buy the motor and printed out the parts with 3D printer instead of having to get the whole thing in box. You could even design your own Zoids. There were marketplaces where you could buy and sell your designs. I myself had a couple I designed. Anyway, that's my peacetime hobby.

Back to reality, we learned that since Decepticons took over, humans had pretty much reverted back to old societies. People wrote letters instead of texting to avoid interceptions from Decepticons. And even dad and I liked to tweak things and made things work, he kind of liked it the old way. Much less screen time. And of course, humans did not just back down. There had been uprising and underground activities to take the world back all over the place.

"You guys were really lucky to get all those weapons." said Dad. "But you can't win with that. There's a better way to do it."

I can't say I like following directions. But I was all ears then.

"Modern technologies are all about GPS and communications. If we can take that down, the Decepticons are pretty much blind."

Just then, we heard jet fighters roaring by. We rushed out to see what's going on. And we saw a squadron of F-14s waiting for us outside. I've always liked F-14. But I was not sure about that then.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9 New Friends**

Just when we were about to start a fight, the cockpit of the leading F-14 opened. Out came the pilot. Once the helmet came off, that's the prettiest girl I had ever seen (I meant, except Summer, of course). She had black long hair, brown eyes, fairest skin I had ever seen. She just looked like a Japanese Idol in a jumpsuit.

"Hi, I'm Yuri. This is my Valkyrie squadron. Nice to meet you."

Then she winked at me. Or did she wink at everyone?

It turned out they were also deserters from the Decepticons. Just like my mission, she was going around trying to connect with people like us to fight the Decepticons. We headed back to the house to discuss strategy. She smiled at me when she passed by me. Or did she smile at everyone?

We basically agreed on disabling the more advanced systems so the F-14s can fight the F-22s with old technology. And frankly, I didn't hear much other than that. I was just thinking if Yuri was looking at me or not. Suddenly she looked at me and said, "So what do you think? Will you join us?"

"Sure thing." I said, trying to look cool. I probably would have said yes to anything she asked.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10 Journey**

Though we agreed our best chance would be to disable the Decepticons advanced communication network, we also thought we do need more manpower. So we decided to continue our journey to recruit both Autobots and Decepticons.

"Sorry that you have to take on so much at such a young age. Best of luck to both of you." said my dad.

I didn't know if I were imagining things. But I thought I saw a flash of tears in Yuri's eyes.

The journey wasn't so bad. It was dangerous at times. But it's good to have someone around my age to travel with. Yuri's friendly and nice. And she was fun to travel with. We would talk at night till we fell asleep.

"So when did you come to the US?"

"You "Americans". When you see East Asians, you just assume we are immigrants. I was born here. So was my dad. I don't know how many generations there are since we were here"

"Sorry about that."

"I don't know when people will just say Americans instead of African Americans, Asian Americans, and so on. I haven't heard anyone say European Americans. But since I am a "Japanese American", I probably do know a bit about the rest of the world compared to the "American American". Talking about immigration, the policy is just funny here. Most countries try to get the professionals they need, but it's just a small proportion here in the US."

"I guess US has always been an immigrant country. So it's supposed to be open to everyone."

"Well, if it is your own home, will you invite everyone in? Even if you let everyone in, who can get in first? There is always a choice. And that lottery thing. I guess people do want God to have a pick too."

"Well, I guess it all depends on what the voters want. After all, US is a democratic country."

"Talking about voting, that's even more bizarre. I find it strange that everyone gets to vote for the President. It just turns out whoever can put on the best show wins."

"Well, I agree that may not be the best way. But that's the least bad way so everyone has a say on who should lead them."

"I would say yes, if that is at the local level. As you really get to know the person you are voting for. But at such high level, I think it should really be the local officials vote who should be serving at the State level, e.g. Then State officials vote for Federal offices. After all, they are career politicians, they work on government daily. They should know better than the average person on who can do the job best. I guess in a sense, the Electoral vote works that way. Anyway, this has its flaws also, I probably need to think more on this. But I don't really like career politicians either. I kind of like Socrates' idea on people should be successful in their profession in life before they go for politics. That will get rid of a lot of the young politicians I guess."

"Yeah. And you mentioned Local, State, and Federal. There's always the question on what should be done at what level also. Should the State do something? Or the Federal?"

"Exactly. And I find it weird social security is being done at the Federal level. I guess there's more resource at the Federal level. And rich regions can help out poor regions. But think about it, who's best in helping someone in need? It's his or her neighbors. They are the best people to know whether the person has been working hard but just got into trouble. Or the person has always been a lazy bummer so they shouldn't help."

"What if that person was born into poverty? Or disabled?"

"That's the thing. Why was someone born into poverty? What were the parents thinking? But of course, there's always the question not of why, but what to do after that happens. And disabled. That all depends on how much resource we have. On how many disabled we can support if they cannot take care of themselves. Not just disabled. Think about the historical disadvantaged. Affirmative action. It's always taking resource from some people to other people."

"These all sound logical. But a bit unkind."

"Let's sleep. I'm getting tired. And also whenever someone starts talking about feeling, there's no point keep talking. We can't continue with a meaning discussion if we all talk about feeling and not argue based on reasoning."

Talking to Yuri reminds me of talking to Summer. It's interesting to see things from different viewpoints.

I can't remember how many places we've been to. Our team grew bigger and bigger and it's looking good. It's getting to be a real force to reckon with then.

Just when I thought everything's going well, we were passing this valley where suddenly we were surrounded by Decepticons.

"Drop your weapons, you are surrounded. Do as I say if you don't want to be buried in the valley."

And just like that, we were taken as prisoners.

But that's not the biggest shock.

"Good job, Yuri. Megatron will be very pleased." I couldn't believe what the leader of the Decepticons said.

"I'm so sorry, Andy."


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11 Betrayal**

We were being transported back to the Decepticons' base. I didn't see Yuri since the betrayal. So was everything fake? The friendship, the laughs…

I overheard a guard saying just another day and we would be at the base. That's when Yuri showed up.

"It took you long enough to show your face."

"I didn't know how to face you, Andy."

"If I were you, I wouldn't know either."

"Andy, I just want to apologize on what I did. I am really really sorry."

I was really angry at Yuri playing with my feelings. But then, she started to sop.

"My dad. He is a scientist at the Decepticons' base. If I don't do this, they would kill him. I'm sorry, Andy. I don't know how to face your dad."

I didn't say a word. And she left. But I think I had forgiven her already.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12 Jail Break**

By that time after so many things, I can say I could sleep in any situation then. But I wasn't really thrilled in going back to the Decepticons' base. So I had trouble sleeping that night. Getting betrayed by Yuri didn't help either.

Just when I was about to finally fall asleep, I heard explosions outside. There seemed to be intense fighting. When things quieted down, Yuri again came to me.

"Let's go, Andy."

"But, what about your dad?"

"I thought through this. I think my dad would have wanted me to do just that."

We went outside. And turned out the Valkyrie team was really with Yuri. And they were strong. I think they wiped out the Decepticons who came to take us as prisoners.

"I don't know if you can forgive me. But I hope to continue the journey with you." said Yuri.

"Did any Decepticons get away?"

"I don't think so."

"Do the Decepticons know about this?"

"I don't think so either."

"Shall we go save your dad then?"


End file.
